The Little First Grand Secretary in My House Chapter 40:

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This article can be read normally if the subscription ratio is ≥50%, otherwise it needs to be delayed for three days, and you can read it immediately if you make up for it. "Look at Hong'er, does he look like you?"

……

Xue Tingyan suddenly felt someone shaking her. She opened her tired eyes and saw the dim inner room. Hu San's face was no longer young. Even the lines on the tent were so familiar. Only then did he realize that he was dreaming.

It’s just that the dream was too clear. The scent of sorghum in the air and the stubborn curve of her mouth made him immersed in it. There were also her tears of anger, which were crystal clear and shining with colorful light. He wanted to reach out and touch them, but was shaken awake.

"Sir, it's time to drink medicine."

Xue Tingyan was propped up and given medicine. He was extremely ill and had to be served by someone to even drink medicine. How could he look like Xue Shoufu, a highly respected minister who had dominated the court for decades.

Oh, no, he is no longer the chief assistant.

He has written a letter to beg for his bones and plans to return to his hometown to retire. The Holy Spirit has approved it, but he has no hometown to return to and no relatives to rely on.

Actually, he didn't plan to go back.

"Master Zhang, Master Wang and Master Li and Master Cao all came to visit you, but they blocked the door at your request. They have been here every day, and today they are here again. Do you want to see me?"

What can they do? They didn't think that his illness was a stopgap measure, waiting for him to stand up and continue leading them to fight against the emperor, but he was really ill, terminally ill, and medicine was ineffective.

"Missing."

"Then please sleep a little longer, sir."

The room became quiet again, and Xue Tingyan's eyelids became heavy again. He blinked again and again and fell into sleep again.

……

"How can Mr. Wang have time to see me?"

Wang Mingsheng's eyes were a little complicated, but there was a smile on his face: "After all, we are ministers of the same court, so I should come to visit the Chief Minister out of emotion and reason."

"I didn't expect you, Wang Mingsheng, to say such false words, but are you here to see if I am dying for the emperor?" Xue Tingyan said sarcastically.

He is obviously an old man with a haggard face and is obviously on the verge of death, but just because of his calm, calm and somewhat unfathomable eyes, people dare not ignore him in the slightest.

After all, this is Xue Shoufu, and this name alone is enough to intimidate everyone. It was the deep-rooted legacy left by Xue Tingyan's three dynasties and decades of experience in the court. It was like a towering ancient tree with intertwined roots. He didn't have to do anything, just standing there was enough to scare everyone.

Otherwise, why would the new emperor have exhausted all his means, yet he still dared not act rashly and only dared to take that roundabout strategy.

"It seems that your Majesty has a lot of misunderstandings."

Xue Tingyan chuckled, half-closed her eyes, and said nothing, apparently too lazy to pay attention to him.

"Actually, I'm here for myself. I'm just here to see how the villain who abandoned his wife and son to join a dragon and a phoenix is ​​now in a miserable state of being alone. I'm afraid Master Xue is dead now, and he doesn't even wear sackcloth or mourning. He has no descendants. In fact, Mr. , or are you afraid that your true identity will be known to the world, reviled by others, and will be infamy for thousands of years?"

"You..."

"To say that you abandoned your wife and son is too embarrassing for you. You should kill your wife and son, right, Master Xue?"

No one knows all this. The world only knows that Xue Shoufu had a first wife before Mrs. Xue, but they don’t know what happened to that first wife. After all, it has been too long. Xue Tingyan has stood in the court for decades, and all his former, former, and current opponents have been trampled under his feet.

The world only knows that the First Assistant is friendly and courteous to others, but they don’t know that the First Assistant also has a sinister side. In recent years, anyone who tried to make a fuss out of his past events ended up being a ghost. No one knows how many innocent souls have been added to it. The only one who knows is probably Wang Mingsheng, the ‘sufferer’.

"You, you are..."

Wang Mingsheng came close to his face: "It's a pity that my mother's fate is great, and my fate is also great. The sunken ship did not kill us, but was saved by others. Do you know that over the years, I I want to see this scene day and night. Unfortunately, you live too long and have all the power. I can only climb up step by step until I can step down on you..."

"You are... Hong'er..." Xue Tingyan said this with great difficulty.

Wang Mingsheng stood up straight and smiled happily: "My name is not Hong'er, and my surname is not Xue, my surname is Wang. My mother remarried, to the man who saved us... You must not Excited, even if you die now, I am not your son..."

Wang Mingsheng has always been known for his calmness and restraint, hiding his secrets. This is probably the first time he has laughed so freely in front of others.

"By the way, you don't have to think that even if my surname is Wang, I can still pass on the Xue family to your family. Let me think about it. When Yuan Ji released the rumor that I had the good fortune of Long Yang, it seemed that you ordered someone to do it. I did it. You really got it right. I don’t like women, so I haven’t married for many years..."

He smiled and looked at the old man on the bed, seeing how shocked, sad and regretful he was.

But so what?

He suddenly found that he was not as happy as he had imagined, and even this smile seemed too fake. He suddenly lost interest, straightened the corners of his mouth, dusted his sleeves, and said: "Since Mr. Xue is okay, I will take my leave."

……

"I didn't, I didn't..."

"Sir, what are you talking about?"

Hearing this voice, the fog in Xue Tingyan's eyes suddenly dispersed, and he suddenly woke up from his dream with a tremble. The dark inner room came into view again, with Hu San's unattractive and even ugly face. There was a bitter medicinal smell in the air, and there seemed to be a rotten breath floating gently.

Xue Tingyan moved her lips, but no sound came out.

"Sir, what did you say?"

Hu San was very anxious and kept asking, but Xue Tingyan was speechless at all. Hu San could only ask based on his own guess: "Are you thinking about what happened before? Don't worry, your words have been passed on to Mr. Zhang, he already knows that Mr. Wang is your only son and will do what you ask."

Xue Tingyan blinked. Hu San thought he had something else to say, so she put her ear next to his mouth, but all she heard was: "I don't..."

No more content after that.

When Hu San looked up anxiously, he saw Xue Tingyan's wide-open eyes and gray-blue face.

He stepped forward with trembling hands and touched the other person's breath, but was so shocked that he sat down on the ground.

*

The cold wind penetrated through the holed window paper, blowing Xue Gouzi's face with a cold expression.

He was startled and opened his eyes.

What stood out in front of my eyes was a small house with blue brick walls and a black tile roof. The walls were plastered with white dust, but it looked gray. The beams were of a log color and were exposed because they had no bearings. There were several bamboo baskets hanging on them. There seemed to be something in the baskets and they were covered with blue cloth.

He was lying on a kang, covered with a quilt that was not old and new. The quilt looked clean and tidy, but in fact the cotton material inside was already hard.

Facing the feet of his kang, there was a row of dark brown kang cabinets. The cabinets were embedded with hinges with bare brass nails and copper spike handles. Simple patterns of auspicious clouds and flowing water were carved on them, making them look heavy and heavy. Without losing generosity. Although it is nothing in a rich family's home, it is already a piece of furniture that can be obtained by a farmer's family.

There is no problem in passing it down to several generations!

This is what his father said back then. His father was the best carpenter in the village.

Xue Gouzi felt that his head hurt, as if someone had hit him hard with a hoe. He tried to sit up, but he was too weak and fell back onto the kang.

Only then did he realize that he was Xue Gouzi, the eldest son of the second wife of the Xue family. Because something happened, he couldn't think about it for a moment and became angry and heartbroken. He had been ill for many days.

He is not Xue Tingyan, that Xue Tingyan is the person in his dream.

How could he be such a person?

To prove that it was all just a dream, he raised his hand and looked at it.

Sure enough! The hand in front of me is slender and white, and has not yet developed the muscles and bones that a man should have. He is only fourteen years old, how could he live to be over seventy years old and still die in peace in the end.

Xue Gouzi let out a heavy breath, looked around again, and finally felt a little calmer.

Someone was talking outside, and the voice came in through the cracks in the window.

"I said Zhao'er, it's not that the fourth aunt said about you. Look what you have become now. A girl who has never left home all day long has actually learned how to do business like those small merchants and hawkers. That business Is it something you can do? Look at your fourth uncle, you can’t lose a lot of money even if you run around outside all day long, so stop fussing, and if you have some time, help your fourth aunt with some work!”

The voice sounded like that of a young woman, but the sarcasm in her words was too strong. It is said that appearance comes from the heart, so it is no wonder that Mr. Sun has a mean face.

This thought flashed through Xue Gouzi's mind subconsciously, and then he was stunned. It was true that he hated his fourth aunt, but how could he miss her so much?

Before he could figure out the reason, he heard the voice in his dream.

"Fourth Aunt, I would like to help you with some work, but you also know that the dog has been ill for many days, and the family gave him a few cents for medicine at first, and he only took it for half a month. Grandma I just said that my family didn’t have enough money to spare, so I asked them to stop taking the medicine. The dog is my man, and I can’t just watch him get sick like this. It’s not impossible for my fourth aunt to ask me to help with the work. Why don’t you lend me some money to buy it? Medicine, can I pay it back to you slowly in the future?"

The owner of the voice was a young girl, and her tone revealed a sense of competence and crispness, mixed with a bit of teasing.

Yes, Zhao'er deliberately ran against Sun.

Ms. Sun has always had the temperament of only getting in and not getting out. It would be extremely difficult for her to come up with a penny, let alone lend it to her two half-grown children.

Now there are only two people left in the second room. The top family is only fourteen, but there is an older one, who is only sixteen and still a girl. Whenever Mrs. Sun heard rumors from the villagers that Zhao'er, a **** girl, had done some business to make money, she would look full of disbelief.

What kind of business this **** girl can make to make money is just digging three melons and two dates from the wild and using it to defraud people in the city in exchange for a few pennies.

"Your fourth aunt doesn't have any money to lend you. All our money is at my mother's place. It's up to you to take care of your mother!" Mrs. Sun patted her **** and stood up and went into the house, too lazy to talk to Zhao'er again. nonsense.

"Since the fourth aunt has no money to lend me, I dare not ask what grandma wants, so I can only figure out where to get some money to give the dog medicine!"

Zhao'er's voice was extremely loud. Naturally, he was not only speaking to Mr. Sun, but also to Mr. Zhao who was sitting in the main hall.

Sure enough, Zhao'er walked into the house with his front legs, and Mrs. Zhao stood at the door and scolded Mrs. Sun: "You haven't washed the pigsty yet, so you are going back to the house to dig out the corpse?"

Zhaoer curled his lips, lifted the door curtain and walked in. He met Xue Gouzi's eyes looking at her.

Zhao'er thinks about it. The people in the county naturally have different opinions than the people in the country, let alone a big **** shop like this. What they think is bad is actually good for the people in the country to see.

She breathed a sigh of relief and said, "I want this package of clothes from Shopkeeper Shen, and I will give you the money right now."

"Are you rich now?"

Of course she has money, Zhao'er now has more than two taels of silver in total, and just now Sulan gave her another five taels, which is naturally enough.

At the same time, Shen Ping laughed and said, "Well, I forgot that you came here after visiting her. She wouldn't take advantage of me." The words were very low, almost mumbling. Zhao'er only looked at the clothes and didn't hear clearly.

"I'll find a guy to call a car for you. Even a little girl like you can't transport these things."

"Thank you, Shopkeeper Shen."

After sending Zhao'er off, Shen Ping turned around and entered the **** shop.

Although he is named the third shopkeeper, he is not the third shopkeeper of this store, but the third shopkeeper of the entire 'He Rongsheng'. It is only at his deliberate request that he will be permanently stationed in Xia County.

Shen Ping is a son of the Shen family. His father is the chief steward of the Shen Mansion, and he has been working with the third young master Shen Fu as a boy since he was a child. When he reached adulthood, he was released and became a shopkeeper.

"If she comes again next time, just do as I told you before."

"Yes, shopkeeper."

*

Just after noon, the waiter Ah Cai came to deliver food to Xue Tingyan.

Boss Chen said it was a simple meal, but in fact the food was not bad, with meat, vegetables and soup. Xue Tingyan knew that Boss Chen was taking care of him deliberately. How could anyone hire someone to copy books and take care of tea and meals, and the wages they paid were not low.

It was because he understood in his heart that he did not refuse verbally. In this case, refusing would preserve his character, but it would seem too petty and pretentious.

It can only be repayment in the future, Xue Tingyan thought lightly in her heart.

After dinner, when the waiter came to clear away the dishes, he said he could rest for an hour. There is a royal couch available in this room. Of course, you can also go to the front and read a book to pass the time.

In fact, the last sentence is the key point. Xue Tingyan was not pretentious. After cleaning her hands, she went forward.

This store may not seem big, but it has a lot of books of all kinds, ranging from rural novels to books about the imperial examination. Among them, there are many books about the imperial examination.

Since the previous dynasty, the imperial examination has used the eight-legged essay as the standard style. The standards are strict, and there are even restrictions on the length of sentences, the number of words, the rhyme and rhyme, and even the scope of the questions.

The title of the eight-part essay comes from the Four Books and Five Classics. It consists of eight parts: breaking the topic, carrying the topic, starting to talk, starting, starting the part, middle part, back part, and closing part. It seems rigid and rigid, but in fact it is difficult to write a good eight-part essay well. not easy. If you really think that just reading the Four Books and Five Classics is enough, you are wrong. Not only do you need to know astronomy and geography, but you must at least be involved in all aspects before you can write a good article that is full of flowers and colorful and meaningful.

In that dream, Xue Tingyan won the Jinshi with the 21st place in the second class, and was admitted to the Hanlin Academy through the imperial examination. He was actually sent to an official position in a place where nothing matters.

Xue Tingyan pursed his lips slightly, feeling that he had thought too much. After all, he was not even a child now, so he should think about the present.